Thursday, February 24, 2011

Around the world, journalists have been shot dead outside their homes, nightclubs or at their work place by unknown assailants and so when an Acting National Security Coordinator of a nation tells a journalist who is doing his work that he would soon get his reward, a lot of questions arise.

According to the Daybreak newspaper, its journalist had sought to find out from Lt. Col AK Gbevlo Lartey, Ghana’s National Security Coordinator whether it was true that intelligence gathered by the paper indicates that his outfit was putting up an office complex for a certain editor at Kanda, a suburb of Accra.This encounter turned sore when like a ‘traditional priest’ possessed by the gods, Lt. Col AK Gbevlo Lartey started ranting.

“You have been publishing this in your paper so why are you calling, go ahead and published it”, the National Security Coordinator noted.He angrily continued: “You have been writing all sorts of things about the military, you go ahead and very soon you would get your reward,” dropping his line immediately after authoring his words of doom or prosperity.

The journalist wanted to find out from the Security Capo whether it was true that a drawing of the said office was in his possession and also for his side of the story which never came to past last Thursday when the call was placed.Even though, the journalist is not scared, he claims “what is Gbevlo talking about, reward in terms of death or what? I am going to lodge a formal [complain] with one of his outfits that is the Ghana Police and if anything happens to me….he should be held responsible, this is palm wine talk and Gbevlo does same, God bless Ghana and the person who appointed him and made Acting”.

It would be re-called that government officials and persons close to the corridors of power last year developed a strange enthusiasm of fabricating dirty lies meant to stain the reputation and destroy the credibility of journalists perceived to be critical of the government of the day. The plan was to accuse the said journalists of extortion and bribery so as to reduce the credibility of stories put out by them. Already, there are reports that government has contracted some reporters to act as spies on their colleagues.Prince Prah , then of the Daily Searchlight and two other broadcast journalists from Joy FM; Sammy Darko and Stephen Anti, who fell victim to this plot and were accused of extortion and bribery, were gleefully put in the public domain via Asempa FM in Accra. Source: DAYBREAK